Speed awareness class

I got a speeding ticket a few weeks ago. I never speed, this was a minor distraction in central London, but still. I was given a choice: pay a penalty (80 GBP) and lose points or take a speed awareness class.

I decided to take the class and I must say it was worthwhile. This is what  I learned.

How do you guess the speed limit if there is no sign?

1. Street lights, no speed limit signs: 30 mph

2. No street lights, single lane both directions with no divider: 60 mph

3. No street lights, two lanes with divider line between them: 70 mph

4. Motorway, solid divider: 70mph

How much does a small increase in speed affect the seriousness of an accident?

At 20mph, 1% of road accidents are fatal

At 30mph, 7% are fatal

At 40mph, 31% are fatal

Where do serious accident take place? On motorways where cars drive faster? 

5% of fatal accidents happen on motorways

33% on rural roads

62% in urban areas

in UK 1700+ people are killed on the roads per year

Drive carefully!

Film review: Wadjda (2012) by Reem Abdullah, *****

Synopsys

A rebellious Saudi Arabian girl hatches a plan to get her hands on the bicycle she craves in this coming-of-age story from first time director Haifaa Al-Mansour. 

Living within a conservative suburb of Riyadh, fun-loving eleven-year-old Wadjda (Waad Mohammed) has her heart set on a green bicycle so that she can beat the boys in their neighbourhood races. 

But when her mother (Reem Abdullah) forbids it, anticipating a reaction from a society that disapproves of women riding bicycles, an enterprising Wadjda decides to raise the money herself by entering a local Qur'an-reading competition that offers a cash prize.

Review

A most interesting if limited peek into Saudi society and especially the position of women. It is pretty incredible the Saudi female director managed to complete filming on location, not everyone was happy with it... Not surprising as movie theaters were not allowed in Saudi Arabia, either, between 1983 and 2018. 

I knew women were not allowed to drive (they now are) but was shocked to learn they were not supposed to ride bicycles. Or touch the Koran when they have their period! 

In the end this movie is about how a little girl wants to have a happy life, she knows nothing about politics and only understand religion inasmuch as they have her memorize verses. A hopeful note of optimism for Saudi Arabia. 

Palau kayak tour

Very American breakfast with lots of fruit juices though they are mostly from concentrate. Disappointing in a tropical island. Lots of processed foods actually, mostly imported from the US and Taiwan, even eggs! 

Weird...In Palau, cars drive on the right-hand side of the road, like in Europe but they all have their wheel on the right-hand side of the vehicle, like in the UK. Very strange. Maybe it's because here cars come mostly from Japan where they drive on the left-hand side of the road so it makes sense to have the wheel on the right-hand side here it's just strange.

We are picked up at our hotel by Marete, a stereotypical tall, blond, blue-eyed Danish lady who is spending a gap year traveling and working around the world with her boyfriend before going back to Denmark and continue her studies. Great idea. Not many Italians do this, even fewer Chinese I think. Too many Italians stay home with mamma until they move in with their wives. Anything to avoid cooking or having to manage a household.

Chinese are just beginning to understand the concept of a gap year. Until now they have to work as soon as possible to support the family. But the rising middle class now knows that is an option and can afford it, we'll see. 

Amazing canoe tour at Risong. A small group of us with a guide who comes from Tinian but has worked here for 12 years: meny more tourists, more money to be made. He takes us through the unmistakable Palauan volcanic formations carpeted with luscious green bushes whose branches overloaded with deep dark leaves reach all the way to the waterline.

An American pilot is with us with his Japanese girlfriends (panta rei, a few decades ago she would have rather died than be anywhere near him). he works for United Airlines is enjoying a day off before returning to Guam, US aviation and military hub in the region. We join a group of 4 elderly and very energetic American ladies. one asks where we live, and when I say London but not sure after Brexit she invites me to move to her native New York city.  

  

We can see small fish of all shapes and colors, a few baby reef sharks and lots of totally innocuous jelly fish, which do not sting as they have no predators in these protected waters. 

Dinner at the Yue Hai restaurant, owned by Cantonese family who moved here some two decades ago also run the hotel's jewelry shop all in the family, including some cousins who have come here for a few years to help and make some dollars. The restaurant is far more appealing and much better value than the jewellery store.

7. - 13 Dec.: Schotia Game reserve to Knysna, via Elephant Back Ride Safari

Get up at the crack of dawn (well almost, it must have been 6:30am) for a quick (wood fire heated) shower in the open, an instant coffee and an early morning walking safari in the hills around our tents. Justin is there as promised and so is the Washington couple we met yesterday.

We start slowly and enjoy the cool early morning air but no animals in sight. The Washington lady jogs around and gets way ahead of the rest of us but suddenly grinds to a halt when in sight of the two huge mammals. Rhinos! Two big white rhinos, buth sadly dehorned by poachers in May 2013.

We can get very close. Maybe a bit too close when Justin tells me to freeze as I drop to the ground to photograph from down up and one rhino puts its big lips on the ground within two meters from the tip of my lens. Great pictures though!

After breakfast we drive to Lenmore, a restaurant not far and our meeting point with Walter, from elephant back ride safari. Yan insisted on doing this and while I was initially a bit reluctant as we have a lot of driving today and lots to see on the way, she was right as this turned out to be a unique experience.

From Lenmore it is a long drive, over one hour on a highway then 45 minutes of a dirt road with potholes the size of bomb craters. We are pretty shattered when we get to the reserve but thrilled with anticipation.

Walter tells us he used to work here but then changed jobs to driver because too remote wants to be with family. Proudly show his name and number still on gate. He now takes cigarettes and other stuff to the staff at the camp who don't see civilization for weeks on end.

There are three elephants, and they always go together even if there are no clients. We rent two elephants and the third just follows... We start a bit late: while the elephants are tamed, they are free to roam around and to gather them for the tourist ride is not always a five minute affair.

It's a lot of fun to ride them, and it is as natural as it gets: no saddles or seats, just our bums on their bare back. Walter smiles when we say we'd like to ride longer than the standard half an hour: "You'll bruise your behind raw!" After 45 minutes we realize he was right, but it was worth it!

At the end of our ride we get a tasty lunch by a small lake, and then all start our way back over the bomb craters to Lenmore and our car.

 Time to drive to Knysna, which we reach after an easy five hour drive on the N2, the long coastal road that runs along South Africa's maritime regions.

Dinner is at the Golf club with Mike, a German friend of mine who used to be my neighbor in Belgium. Rather an ex German I should say: he moved to Italy from his native country when he was very young, married Carla, a bright and beautiful Italian lady he met at work, and lived and worked around the world ever since. Ten years ago he retired and they decided to abolish Fall and Winter from their vocabulary: May to October in Italy, and November to April in South Africa, where of course the seasons are inverted. Carla sadly passed away a few years ago but Mike keeps his seasonal hybernation routine.

There is a birthday party going on and the main dining room is taken. Crowds of all-white friends singing South Africa's national anthem. I am especially struck by their singing the rifst lines in Xhosa: Nkosi sikelele Afrika... A song full of meaning, especially when sung by whites. The new South Africa.

No fear: we get table in the main hall, between the kitchen and the bar. Delicions seafood, nice full bodied Chardonnay from the Cape (beer for Mike) and a very forgiving check. The strong Euro buys a pretty good time in South Africa this year.

Itinerary of trip to South Africa - December 2013 / January 2014

Itinerary - South Africa December 2013 – January 2014 (click on a date or a daily itinerary to link to related post)
Day	Dec.	Daily itinerary	Night	Km
1	7	Arrival in South Africa and tour of Port Elizabeth	P.E.	25
2	8	Port Elizabeth to Lalibela and first game drive	Lalibela	90
3	9	Lalibela game drives and walks	Lalibela	50
4	10	Game drives and night safari	Lalibela	50
5	11	Lalibela Lodge to Schotia Safari Game Reserve	Schotia	60
6	12	Game drives and walks at Schotia Game Reserve	Schotia	40
7	13	Schotia to Knysna, via Elephant Back Ride Safari	Knysna	275
8	14	Knysna golf and tour	Knysna	10
9	15	Knysna golf and spa	Knysna	10
10	16	Knysna golf and dining	Knysna	10
11	17	Knysna properties and drive through the mountains to Swellendam	Swellendam	200
12	18	Swellendam kayak and sherry	Swellendam	50
13	19	Swellendam to Cape Town, through Stellenbosch	Cape Town	160
14	20	Cape Town tour and music	Cape Town	60
15	21	Cape Town to Franschhoek	Franschhoek	75
16	22	Franschhoek	Franschhoek	0
17	23	Wine tasting in Stellenbosch and Paarl	Franschhoek	50
18	24	Paarl wine tasting for Christmas eve	Franschhoek	60
19	25	From wineland to Johannesburg	Johannesburg	75
20	26	City tour of Johannesburg	Johannesburg	80
21	27	Soweto and drive to Mabhoko Ndebele village	Mabhoko	280
22	28	Models and billiard at Mabhoko Ndebele village	Mabhoko	0
23	29	Mbahoko Ndebele village to Kruger National Park	Kruger	450
24	30	Alarms and mating lions at the Kruger National Park	Kruger	60
25	31	Kruger through Swaziland to S. Lucia	S. Lucia	650
	Jan.
26	1	New Year's day at Saint Lucia	S. Lucia	0
27	2	Drive to Durban and flight to Port Elizabeth	P.E.	250
28	3	Port Elizabeth - Seaview - Jeffrey bay	Jeffrey Bay	80
29	4	Knysna township	Mossel Bay	325
30	5	Bartolomeu Dias, Indian food and vintage music at Mossel Bay	Mossel Bay	40
31	6	Mossel Bay to Hermanus	Hermanus	320
32	7	Hermanus to Cape Town via Boulders Park and Good Hope	Cape Town	175
33	8	Cape Town wine tasting and Langa, Khayelitsha and Gugulethu townships	Cape Town	150
34	9	Cape Town slaves, cannons and jazz	Cape Town	40
35	10	Ending with a big bang, see you soon again South Africa	airplane	25
		TOTAL	KM	4275

16° g - 27 AGO: Manali – Chandigarh, km 350

Partiamo alle 8, Thakur ci affida a due Toyota Innova fiammanti, con due autisti impeccabili e un po' formali e taciturni, ma comunque bravi nel loro mestiere. Scendiamo nella valle di Kullu. Verdissima, meleti e fabbriche di scialli. Ci fermiamo al mercato di Manali, frutta, verdura di più... coloratissimo e puzzonentissimo, ma ovviamente anche molto fotogenico!

12° g - 16 AGO: Trasferimento a Neiafu, karting, shopping

Decidiamo di lasciare Mala island un giorno prima, il posto è carino ma lui è veramente strano, difficile da sopportare e le sistemazioni sono senza charme, anonime, un po’ deprimenti. Il proprietario storce la bocca ma alla fine acconsente a non farci pagare penalità. Il fatto è che ci siamo stufati delle sue scempiaggini ed il servizio lascia molto a desiderare, peccato perché il posto meriterebbe di essere curato di più.

Road safety signs in Ladakh and Zanskar

These are my top three favorites:

1st prize

LOVE THY NEIGHBOUR
BUT NOT WHILE YOU ARE DRIVING

2nd prize

A CAT HAS NINE LIVES YOU HAVE ONLY ONE

3rd prize

GOD MADE LADAKH, WE CONNECT IT TO THE REST OF THE WORLD (BORDER ROAD ORGANIZATION)

Book Review: Adventure Capitalist, by Jim Rogers, *****

Jim and wife Paige at the end of their tour in 2002.

Synopsis

The bestselling author of Investment Biker is back from the ultimate road trip: a three–year drive around the world that would ultimately set the Guinness record for the longest continuous car journey. In Adventure Capitalist, legendary investor Jim Rogers, dubbed "the Indiana Jones of finance" by Time magazine, proves that the best way to profit from the global situation is to see the world mile by mile. "While I have never patronized a prostitute," he writes, "I know that one can learn more about a country from speaking to the madam of a brothel or a black marketeer than from meeting a foreign minister."

14° g - 1 Sett: Arusha – Dar es Salaam – Zanzibar

Partenza prima dell’alba, alle 6. Il bus ci viene a prendere in Hotel, che è sulla strada. Il mezzo è ottimo, nuovo e pulito. L’autista, come tutti qui, corre come un forsennato, facciamo il pelo a passanti e ciclisti, per non parlare degli animali. Con primo chiarore dell’alba passiamo accanto al Kilimangiaro, che ci appare per un attimo in tutta la sua maestosità. Sul mezzo ci sono, oltre ovviamente a molti turisti, anche parecchi tanzaniani di classe media, che si possono permettere quello che qui è considerato un mezzo di lusso: costo 8000 scellini.

14° g - 26 GIU: Tso Moriri – Debring (cambio automezzi) – Sarchu 180 KM ORE 7

Lungo trasferimento attraverso le montagne verso il Himachal Pradesh. A Debring incontriamo il minibus mandatoci da Delhi e lasciamo i nostri due autisti con le Toyota. Spazi enormi, infiniti, terra brulla, quasi desertica. Silenzio interrotto solo dai diesel delle jeep.

Proseguiamo fino al campeggio attrezzato di Sarchu, dove passiamo la notte. Un posto piacevole in una verde vallata, apprezzo particolarmente i colori crepuscolari dell’ora blu. Dormiamo al campeggio “Sarchu Height Adventure India Camp” ;600 Rps cena un po’ scarsa.

11° g - 23 Giugno: Leh – Valle di NUBRA , Diskit, Hunder 150 KM ORE 5

Partenza da Leh per il passo di Khardung-la, forse il più alto passo carrozzabile del mondo a oltre 5600mlsm. Attenzione alla programmazione di questo trasferimento, perché la strada non è aperta tutti i giorni, o lo è ma a sensi alternati (giorni pari o dispari, mattina/pomeriggio) e non sempre prevedibili, in quanto decidono anche da un giorno all’altro in base alla situazione neve.

17° g - 23 AGO: Kerman – Shiraz

Lunghissimo trasferimento in bus attraverso paesaggi desertici, desolati ma a tratti affascinanti. Ci fermiamo per strada a comprare fichi secchi e freschi.

Come albergo stiamo allo Shiraz Eram, ottimo, centrale, 35 USD la doppia, TLF, ottima colazione compresa. A cena in uno dei tanti lungo la strada Chamran, affollata dai locali, sulle colline sovrastanti la città verso nord - ovest. Piacevole ed interessante, si mangia tra migliaia di iraniani che fanno il picnic sulle aiuole, e ci sono spesso mercatini e mostre lungo la strada.

13° g - 30 DIC: da Sanchi a Bhopal a Mandu

Al mattino passaggio rapido per Bhopal, dove visitiamo l'importante moschea. Ci sono tantissimi bambini seduti per terra, a testa bassa, tutti intenti a memorizzare ill Corano. In un angolo un maestro interroga uno scolaro, che però non si ricorda i versi a memoria tanto bene, lui lo aiuta un po' poi lo manda via a studiare ancora.

17. - 24 AUG: Muang Khua to Udom Xai

Departure after the usual banana pancakes for breakfasts, I am getting a bit tired of them but heck... It is not without some apprehension that we started our drive from Muang Khua toward the Oudomxai province. We had been warned of landslides, uncertain how long it would take or even whether we would make it at all. We had also been assured that work was in progress to clear the roads, but somehow that did not quite sound as reassuring as we would have wished. So we are off, no choice now...

10. - 9 AUG: Drive to Hwange national park

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7. - 6 AUG: Masvingo to Bulawayo

Depart for Bulawayo and the Matopos - approximately 3.5 hours drive.
Big Cave Camp -

5. - 4 AUG: Harare to Masvingo (Great Zimbabwe)

Hertz Rent-a-car delivers our car at Imba Matombo at 08h30. We load all our stuff, get easy directions from the driver and head South for an easy drive to Masvingo. This is a 3 hour drive on an almost entirely straight road.

The condition of the tarmac is good, and after a short while I get used to driving on the left-hand side of the road.


We check in at the Lodge of The Ancient City again on a Half Board basis. Again a luxury hotel with thatched roofs that blends in perfectly with the local environment.

Rest of the day at leisure, we take a short walk and spend a pleasant evening at the lodge, comforted by a great meal of game and South African wines.

Driving back through Yugoslavia and on to Italy

Left Balaton lake at 10.00am. It would have been nice to spend more time here, after four intense months, and relax a bit, take in the cool atmosphere and sip Hungarian wine, by far the best that is coming from the brotherhood of socialist countries. (Georgians might disagree, and I must admit I don't know Georgian wine much.) Much better than the Crimean "champagne" we had in the USSR.

The road is just OK and we proceed slowly toward Yugoslavia. No problem with this border. Two socialist countries, in theory ideological siblings. In practice, Yugoslavia has long been pursuing its own version of socialism, quite open to the West and relatively more relaxed at home.

Surprisingly, the roads in Yugoslavia are worse than in Hungary or Poland. At least the ones we drive on today. Once we reach Nova Gorica, the Yugoslav half of Gorizia, I pull into a service station to fill up Giallina. Gasoline is much cheaper here that in Italy. The man at the pump speaks Italian and says he only agrees to sell us fuel because he sees Giallina has a Roman plate. He refuses to sell to Italians from Trieste and Gorizia, who just cross the border to take advantage of subsidized fuel. Border inhabitants of both Italy and Yugoslavia can go shopping in each other's country fairly easily, and while Yugoslavs go to Italy to buy what they can't find at home, Italians hop beyond the border to buy cheap subsidized staples, fuel first of all.

We reach Mestre at about 9:00pm and get a couple of rooms at the "Garibaldi" hotel. Then out for pizza. Nice to be back in Italy, I enjoy hearing Italian and soaking the warm air, though everything now seems soooo expensive! A pizza here is more expensive than a gourmet fine dining experience in Warsaw!

Highway experiences and Novgorod churches

Departure in the morning direction Nogvorod. We'll miss Igor for the rest of our trip, he was fun company and quite informative. But then again who knows, maybe he was a KGB operative, haha, no I don't think so but it is not inconceivable. So few tourists these days, and three kids from NATO countries in a yellow Volkswagen? Very suspicious!

It's a long ride and the road is of mediocre quality at best. About 50km out of Moscow, there is some road work on the highway. Again, as we have seen before just after we entered the USSR, most, in fact, all workers are women. The workers who work that is. There is plenty of men road workers who just lie down by the roadside and look on.

Soviet female road workers and male onlookers.

Anyway, after witnessing some of the work of the unsmiling stocky Soviet ladies, we can see all vehicles ahead of us are re-routed to a secondary, much smaller, road. When we approach the deviation the man who is sending everyone for the detour flags us to go straight through and stay on the main highway. Such a privilege! Why? I imagine they don't want to show foreign capitalists poorly paved secondary roads that would make the country look bad. Not sure.

We then keep driving splendidly alone on this newly surfaced black highway. Almost alone that is, because at some point we are passed by a very official-looking convoy of black cars, led by two big Mercedes Benz sedans (the first we have seen in the USSR) with police markings. Usually the police have Ladas, this must be an important convoy but they are too fast for us to try and peek inside and maybe try to recognize a Politburo member or two. The only problem is that the tar is so fresh much of it gets thrown up by Giallina's tires and ends up sticking to her pristine yellow sides. It will take a lot of work to clean it up when we get around to it.

When we reach Novgorod we settle down in our assigned camping ground then head to town. Lots of small churches, I counted at least twenty, all next to each other in the same part of town. And they are ALL shut down "NA REMONT", for restoration. It's one of the first Russian words I've learned and I've read it so many times I am sure I'll never forget it. Can't get into any of them. Oh well.